


Paper Rings

by SpaceWaffleHouseTM



Series: One Shots from the Waffle House [32]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Childhood Friends, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Growing Up Together, I Physically Cant Stop Writing These Two Getting Hitched, Marriage Proposal, No Pregnancy, Vows, Wedding Fluff, Weddings, ben is an idiot, pinky promises
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-01
Updated: 2020-08-01
Packaged: 2021-03-06 00:54:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,656
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25644625
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SpaceWaffleHouseTM/pseuds/SpaceWaffleHouseTM
Summary: In first grade, Rey and Ben Solo get ‘married’ on the playground with rings made of leaves and twigs. Twenty years later Ben proposes for real — using that very same ring.
Relationships: Kylo Ren/Rey, Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Series: One Shots from the Waffle House [32]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1298357
Comments: 98
Kudos: 414
Collections: Galactic Idiots Collection





	Paper Rings

**Author's Note:**

> This is not edited because it’s nearly three in the morning and I need sleep but curse you galacticidiots for this [prompt](https://twitter.com/galacticidiots/status/1289421015315931138?s=21).

The first time Ben slides a ring on her hand their fingers are tiny, a little chubby, and slightly sticky from the peanut butter and jelly sandwiches they’d eaten at lunch. They’re sitting on the playground at recess, legs swinging off of where the little fire pole waits for them to slide to the ground, and Rey’s giggling helplessly as he secures the little piece of wood and leaves onto her finger. 

It’s a little itchy, but she loves it, and it prompts her to hold out the little one she’d made for him, which is only slightly bigger. She likes to think it’s because right now, he is barely an inch taller than her, but he always likes to make jokes about how he’ll grow big and strong and be a head taller one day, she just has to watch. All she ever tells him in response is  _ not yet, Solo _ , and somehow, in all that teasing they’ve done, they’re here. 

This is kind of ridiculous, really, but it’s fun and it makes her cheeks flush pink and her smile part wide. They’d gotten the idea yesterday when Rey had made a joke about how she didn’t think anyone would ever want to marry her. Ben, of course, always the idiot, quickly rushed to say, “I’ll marry you, then,” and the rest was history. 

Now they’re sitting here, just one day later, putting rings on each other’s fingers because even though it’s just pretend, even though Rey has no idea what love or marriage really mean, she knows Ben’s going to be her best friend forever. And marriage is forever, isn’t it? 

“Are we supposed to say vows?” he asks, sounding genuinely confused as Rey slips his ring on his finger, looking up into his eyes through the thin curtain of dark waves that have fallen into his eyes. 

“What?” 

“I-I-i don’t know, I thought people said vows at weddings.”

She giggles again, looking down at the little rings on their fingers, which are somehow not falling apart in spite of their shoddy design, then back at him. “What’s a vow?” 

“Uh… I don’t know. It’s just something people say. My mom said she told my dad she’d always kick his ass if he ever acted like an idiot,” he grumbles, causing Rey to gasp, her eyes searching around for whether or not any of the teachers nearby heard them. 

“Ben! That’s a bad word!” 

“My mom said it,” he replies with a somewhat embarrassed shrug. “So what would you say?”

“Is it like a pinky swear?”

He smiles, his eyes closing as he laughs. “I think so. Yeah, a pinky swear.”

She holds out her pinky. “Okay then.”

His pinky wraps around hers, the backs of their rings nearly touching where their hands are joined. “I pinky promise to marry you someday if no one else does. Or if you want to.” A sheepish look crosses his face, then he looks down at their feet as they swing in the open air, narrowly missing the other kids in their class as they run about beneath them. 

“And I pinky promise to always kick your ass if you act like an idiot.”

“Hey!”

“Your mom said it.” She shrugs, then he’s laughing again as she leans a little closer to him. “And I pinky promise to marry you someday, if you want to.” Then she leans in, and presses a tiny kiss to his cheek, peals of laughter leaving her as she watches him turn crimson, and they finally unlink their pinkies. 

It’s then that the recess bell rings, signaling to all the students playing out on the equipment that they needed to come back inside. Groaning, both Rey and Ben push themselves off of the playground, and walk back inside hand in hand with rings on their fingers, neither one of them aware that those silly little leaf and twig bound rings will last them a lot longer than just the one recess they’d intended them for. 

*

The second time Ben slides a ring on her finger, it’s twenty years later, and he’s made a lot more vows and pinky promises to her since then. They remain friends through high school, but their little wedding becomes nothing more than a nice little memory at the back of their minds. By luck, they wind up at the same college, and somewhere down the line, their feelings become… something else. 

Rey asks him on a date on the first day of sophomore year. 

_ Like a date, date? _

_ A date, date.  _

His confusion and genuine bewilderment are still her favorite pictures on her camera roll. She’s saved them since then, keeping them close to her heart at all times in hopes that they’ll lead to something beautiful. 

Those pictures are followed shortly after by their first kiss, which happens under an oak tree while they’re out catching fireflies in the dead of night. She’d been too nervous to kiss him on their first date, she isn’t going to miss out on her second opportunity. Of course, one kiss leads to another, then back to her place for a surprisingly innocent night of spooning on her living room couch. 

Well, spooning and helpless giggling every ten minutes when his foot nudges her calf. 

Spooning, helpless giggling, and a quietly whispered,  _ I love you,  _ when he thinks she’s fallen asleep. An equally quiet,  _ I love you, too,  _ leaves her just before she finally passes out, and the warm arms that flex around her feel more like home than any place has ever felt. 

What follows is four years of pure bliss. They become more serious throughout the remainder of college, and they get their first place together after graduation; a cute little townhouse across the city from his parents and three miles from hers. They’re close to family, but they have their own space, just the way she wants it. 

The place is theirs. They hold parties in it, make memories, dance, and fall further in love. It’s here where Ben slides a ring onto her finger the second time. Well, he tries to. It’s just after she’s gotten home for the day, she’s tired, she wants to sleep, but the minute she opens the door she can smell his cooking and she thinks maybe it can wait a few more minutes. 

When she walks into the kitchen, she’s prepared to make some kind of innuendo about the appetite she has, but then she sees Ben standing away from the stove at the entrance of the room, his face pale and his body stiff. “Ben?” she asks, worry lacing her voice because,  _ oh god,  _ has something happened? “Are you okay?”

“Marry me,” he blurts, then he holds out his hand, a circular piece of junk resting in his palm. 

She blinks at him, unsure if she heard him correctly, then her eyes land on the junk in his hand, and she realizes that’s not junk at all. That’s the old ring he once gave her when they had their pinky promise wedding.  _ Oh… oh god he’s kept it all these years, hasn’t he? _ “Ben, I—“

“Oh my god, I wasn’t supposed to ask you like that,” he breathes, his cheeks flushing pink just like they had that day when they’d first gotten married. “I wanted to get down on one knee, I—fuck.” He runs a hand through his hair, those raven waves significantly longer and thicker than they’d been the first time they’d done this. “Rey, I—fuck it, will you marry me?”

For a moment, she just stands there enjoying the look on his face, then she puts him out of his misery. “I made you a promise, didn’t I?” she asks, stepping closer and taking his hand in hers as she rests her other one on his cheek. “I told you I’d marry you one day, if you wanted. I pinky swore.”

They both laugh, but Ben’s laughter is accompanied by tears, ones she’s quick to wipe away even if she suspects they stem from relief. “You did.”

“I don’t break my promises. Even first grade pinky promises,” she tells him, then she lets go of his hand and spreads her fingers, gesturing for him to put their poorly crafted—yet somehow very durable—ring on her finger. 

Sniffling quietly, he laughs at himself as he slips the ring on her finger, shaking his head all the while. “I’m so sorry I messed this up, I—“ he takes her cheeks in his hands, his palms warm against her skin. “I just really want to marry you.”

A big smile parts her lips. “I just really want to marry you, too.” Then she leans forward, and kisses his cheek, just like she had at their wedding. “I don’t care how you proposed. I loved this. You were so cute and flustered and it-it made me realize again all of the reasons why I’m in love with you.” The hand at his cheek shifts back to cup the base of his skull. “This was perfect, I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

“Pinky promise?” he asks, and she laughs as she rests her forehead against his. 

“Pinky promise,” she replies, then she leans forward, and kisses him properly, contentment welling within her as her fiancé kisses her back, his fingers threading themselves through her hair as he pulls her closer. It almost feels like another vow, another promise, as if his words weren’t enough and he has to reassure her physically that he wants this. 

But she knows, she’s known for twenty years since they sat next to each other in Ms. Holdo’s class in the first grade, they’re going to marry each other—that they want to marry each other. Someday soon, she’s going to kiss him again at the end of an aisle, and that promise they made to one another will finally, indisputably be fulfilled. 

**Author's Note:**

> This fic has [art](https://twitter.com/spacewafflehou1/status/1291417881243262977?s=21) by the lovely ang3lview on twitter!


End file.
